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Classical CD of the Week
“…Batiashvili revels in the challenges, technical and expressive, that Lindberg has placed before her. This is a commanding first recording of a work that, in its approachability and appeal, deserves to become a modern
classic”
“The formidable Lisa Batiashvili plays the hugely demanding solo part with breathtaking brilliance”
February 2008
*****
“Still there's plenty of drama, fire and lyrical beauty in the Lindberg Concerto and the brilliant young soloist Lisa Batiashvili makes plenty of it. This is a searing performance, with strong support from the Finnish Radio Symphony… superbly recorded.”
November 2007
“…Lisa Batiashvili, whose agility and tonal sweetness serve as an ideal foil for the blinding colours on Lindberg's constantly shifting canvas. Sibelius's Concerto provides a comforting disc companion, especially as the performance so memorably focuses on the dreamier elements of the first movement. Batiashvili bows a seamless sensual line, her tone smooth as silk. Sakari Oramo conducts a cleanly detailed and warmly articulated accompaniment, stronger on pulse than on drama, and at times sounding almost like chamber music.”
2010
“It's been said that Magnus Lindberg forges his works more from harmony and rhythm than from unfolding melodic lines, and the celestial acrobatics of this neatly constructed Violin Concerto, a real star-burst of a piece, tend to bear out that theory. It was premiered last year in New York, the soloist, as here, Lisa Batiashvili, whose agility and tonal sweetness serve as an ideal foil for the blinding colours on Lindberg's constantly shifting canvas. The work opens like a bright light descending, the soloist a first among equals who, beyond her brief cadenza, witnesses a gradual darkening of orchestral texture. The harmonic complexion can be either ravishing or dissonant, and the range of musical gesture, from ethereal reverie to Bartókian dance is consistently gripping. The breathless stream of invention recalls Lindberg's similarly hyperactive Clarinet Concerto – anyone who enjoyed that work should relish this one too. Sibelius's Concerto provides a comforting disc companion, especially as the performance so memorably focuses on the dreamier elements of the first movement. Batiashvili bows a seamless, sensual line, her tone smooth as silk. Sakari Oramo conducts a cleanly detailed and warmly articulated accompaniment, stronger on pulse than on drama, and at times sounding almost like chamber music. Those who like their Sibelius flinty or rough-hewn might find this reading just a little too civilised, though for me the joy of hearing everything so considerately thought through and 'joined up' more than compensates for a lack of elemental drive. In any case it's the Lindberg that makes this disc unmissable.”
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